Nanny Next Door (17 page)

“That’s not funny,” Sydney said. Jason had been furious last night. Not that she thought he would actually hurt Daniel. At least, she hoped he wouldn’t.

Angie blew out an exasperated breath. “Oh, hell, I can’t stay mad at him. He’s a doofus, but I love him to death. He has a good heart.”

“’Morning,” Lacey said shuffling into the kitchen. “Is there any coffee left?”

Sydney turned in her direction to reply and stopped dead, her mouth nearly falling open.

Gone were the colorful streaks in her hair, and the obnoxious makeup. Sydney had almost forgotten that Lacey’s eyes were large and round like her own, not dark slashes in her face. She’d taken the ring out of her brow and had only two small stud earrings in each ear.

Sydney wanted to tell Lacey how great she looked, but she was afraid she might jinx it.

“There a little left in the pot,” Angie said, her eyes also fixed on Lacey.

“What are you two staring at?” Lacey asked, obviously enjoying the shock value.

“Did you do something different with your hair?” Angie asked casually, pouring Lacey the last of the coffee.

Lacey took the cup and spooned sugar into it. “You guys are weird. Has anyone seen Jordan?”

“In his room asleep.” Angie pointed her spoon at Sydney. “Hey, you think maybe they got lost in the Bermuda Triangle?”

Lacey rolled her eyes—her big, beautiful eyes. “The triangle is in the Atlantic Ocean between Miami, Bermuda and Puerto Rico. And Jordan isn’t in his room.”

Angie frowned. “He’s not?”

As if on cue, Sydney heard the sound of a boat engine.

Angie looked out the window. “They’re back. And Jordan is with them.”

Sydney moved next to Angie and peered out. Jordan was tying the boat to the dock. Jason hopped out next, then Daniel—in one piece, thank God. As a matter of fact, they all looked…happy?

“Is it my imagination or are they smiling?” Sydney asked.

The three men walked up the beach to the porch. Jason was first through the door.

“Good morning, ladies.” He tipped his baseball cap at Sydney and Lacey, and kissed Angie.

She wrinkled her nose and frowned. “Have you been
smoking?
”

Daniel and Jordan followed him inside.

“Where have you been?” Sydney asked.

“We went fishing,” Daniel said.

Hearing his voice, April squealed and banged the high chair tray until he came over and dropped a kiss on the top of her rumpled head. “G’morning, munchkin.”

“If you went fishing, where are the fish?” Angie asked.

“We didn’t catch any,” Jordan said. “We mostly just talked about sports. It was a male bonding thing.”

Male bonding?
Last night Jason and Daniel had wanted to hurt each other.

Angie looked from her brother to her fiancé. “So, you two are good now?”

Daniel looked at Jason. They both shrugged and Jason said. “Yeah, we’re good.”

“Oh, and by the way,” Daniel said, walking over to Angie. He pulled her into his arms and hugged her hard. “I’m sorry.”

She kissed his cheek. “You know I can’t stay mad at you.”

Sydney glanced over at Lacey and realized she was gazing up at Jordan with the biggest doe eyes Sydney had even seen, and Jordan was smiling back at her.

Huh?

When had they stopped wanting to zap each other off of the planet?

Jordan gestured toward the door and Lacey, without taking her eyes off of him, said, “Mom, we’re going for a walk.”

Jordan took her hand and they stepped onto the porch. Eyes wide, Angie asked, “What the hell was that? I thought they hated each other.”

“Who called it?” Daniel said, sounding proud of himself.

“Called what?” Jason asked.

“He thought that they were pretending they didn’t like each other, because they actually
did
like each other,” Angie said.

“Hell, I knew that,” Jason said, and Angie gave him a playful shove.

“Who wants breakfast?” she said.

Sydney and Angie made everyone a pancake breakfast. Afterward the kids went down to the beach for a swim, while the adults lounged on the porch, drank iced coffee and chatted. It was a perfect day. Sunny and warm with a gentle breeze blowing off the ocean. Sydney wished they could stay another night, but everyone had to work Monday, so around four they packed up the van and piled in. This time Lacey and Jordan sat cuddled together in the corner, and every now and then out of the corner of her eye, Sydney saw them sneak a kiss.

“Is that not the sweetest thing you’ve ever seen?” Angie leaned forward to whisper.

“They do make a cute couple,” Sydney whispered back.

Daniel, looking puzzled, asked, “When did her hair stop being green?”

When they got home Angie gave Sydney a big hug and said, “Thanks for coming with us. I loved having you there.”

“I had a great time.”

“We’re going to do a girls’ night out soon. Me and you and my sisters. Dinner and a movie.”

Sydney tried to recall the last time she’d been out with the girls, but found she couldn’t remember. “Sounds like fun.”

Lacey and Jordan said a long, lingering goodbye, as if they wouldn’t be seeing each other for a month, when in reality they would be reunited the next morning at work. And not five minutes after she finished unpacking, Lacey was calling him on her cell phone.

Sydney unpacked, and was on her way out the door to Daniel’s when the home phone started to ring. When she saw Jeff’s number she almost didn’t answer it, but she saw on the caller ID that he’d called several times while they were gone, so this must be important.

The first words out of his mouth when she picked up were, “Where the hell have you been?”

Normally that would have annoyed the hell out of her, but Sydney had had such a fun weekend, nothing could spoil her good mood.

“We went away for the weekend,” she told him.

“Without telling me? With
my
daughter,” he snapped. “Yes.”

Her calm disposition seemed to infuriate him. “Where did you go?”

“Away with friends,” she said.

“Friends? You mean your
boyfriend.
”

“He was there.”

“And you think that’s an appropriate atmosphere for our daughter?”

“Yes, I do.”

Her answer must have stunned him, because it took him a full ten seconds to respond. “I’m disappointed in you, Sydney. And you leave me no choice. I’m calling my lawyer in the morning and I’m going to file for sole custody.”

As if she hadn’t heard that tired old threat a dozen times before. “You go ahead and do that.”

“You don’t think I will?”

“Frankly, I don’t care either way.”

“Oh, I see. Now that you have a boyfriend, you don’t want your daughter around?”

“Lacey is almost sixteen, Jeff. Do you honestly think a judge is going to change the custody order without talking to her first? And what do you suppose she’ll say? That she’d love to go live with her dad and his girlfriend, the one he was screwing while he was still married to her mother? I’m sure she won’t tell the judge what a horrible, humiliating experience it was to have the whole town know her family’s business. So you go ahead and file for full custody.”

“You’re turning her against me,” he said.

“No, you’ve done that all by yourself. Now, I have to go. I’ve got a date with my boyfriend.” A boyfriend who cared about her feelings and treated her a damn sight better than Jeff ever had. And because of that, because of his decency, in the short time she had known Daniel, she’d come to care more about him, come to love him more, than she’d ever loved Jeff.

She was tempted to tell Jeff that, but he wasn’t even worth the breath she’d have to expend. She hung up instead.

She was sure it was fluke. She hadn’t had a late period in four years, since she started taking birth control pills. And the fact that she was
on
the pill should have made getting pregnant impossible. Right?

But her period should have started on Tuesday, and now it was Friday and she hadn’t so much as had a cramp. She didn’t honestly think she could be pregnant, but she decided that taking a test, and seeing the negative result, would give her the reassurance she needed.

And if it wasn’t negative? There was no point in even considering that, because it wasn’t a possibility.

Daniel was working the afternoon shift, so after he left for work she packed April in the van and they took a trip to the store. She needed groceries anyway, so why not kill two birds, right? There were a dozen different brands of test, so she chose the most expensive, thinking it would be the most reliable, and grabbed a second, just in case the first was defective.

Back at her house, Sydney set April in her ExerSaucer, then carried in the groceries and put them away. She felt weird taking the test at Daniel’s house. With her luck he would stop by and catch her in the act. Which would undoubtedly freak him out, even if it did turn out negative.

So she dragged the ExerSaucer into the hallway outside the bathroom, so she could keep an eye on April, then she sat on the edge of the toilet and read the directions thoroughly. Twice. Then, following them to the letter, she took the test.

Even though she was sure she wasn’t pregnant, the next three minutes were among the longest of her life.
Pregnant
or
not pregnant.
She watched the seconds tick by, and when the three minutes were up she took a deep breath and turned it over.

Oh, shit.

Pregnant.

No, that couldn’t be right. She was on the pill. There was no way she could be pregnant. She grabbed the second test and ripped open the plastic.

This time the three minutes took an
eternity.
She picked up the test with a trembling hand.

Shit.

Another positive.

No. This could
not
be happening. Then she had a thought. Maybe being on the pill could cause a false positive. Didn’t it make a woman’s body think it was pregnant?

That made perfect sense.

She heard the front door open, and Lacey called out.

Sydney grabbed the test wands and stuck them back in the box, which she then shoved into the cabinet under the sink.

“Why are you in this bathroom?” Lacey asked from the doorway.

“Straightening up,” she lied, pulling herself to her feet. “Why are you home so early?”

“Early? It’s almost six.” She nodded to Sydney’s shorts and tank. “Is that what you’re wearing?”

“Wearing?”

“To the movie. Angie said she would be here at six-thirty to get pick you up.”

Oh, hell. She had completely forgotten she and Angie were having a girls’ night out and Lacey and Jordan were watching April. Dinner and a movie was the last thing she wanted to do right now. But she couldn’t cancel on such short notice.

“I need to get in the shower,” Lacey said. “I’m all sweaty from work.”

“Sure, of course,” Sydney said, stepping out into the hall, hoping Lacey wouldn’t look under the sink.

“Are you okay?” Lacey asked. “You seem…nervous.”

“No, I’m just…it’s been a busy day.”

“Okay, well, I’ll be out in a few minutes.”

It was too late to call the doctor’s office, so Sydney grabbed April, went into the den and booted up the computer. She did an internet search on “birth control pills” and “false positive pregnancy tests.” The more she read, the lower her heart sank. According to every source, there was nothing in birth control pills that could cause a false positive.

Meaning the odds were pretty good that she was pregnant.

She erased the search history and, feeling oddly numb, forced herself to go to her room and change, wondering how she was going to tell Daniel. How would he react? He already had one baby that he hadn’t planned for. And she knew he didn’t want to get married. Not yet, anyway. She honestly believed that they would be a family eventually, but after only a couple of months? She didn’t think Daniel was even close to being ready for such a permanent commitment.

Sydney didn’t need more time to know that she would be happy spending the rest of her life with him. And although it came as a shock, she wanted this baby. She loved Daniel. And though he had never said it, there was a chance he loved her, too.

And really, there was no reason she had to tell him right away. Maybe first she should try to get a feel for his state of mind. Hint around about the future and see how he reacted. And if he reacted badly? If he didn’t want her or the baby? She couldn’t fool herself into thinking that wasn’t a possibility. At least this time it was
his
baby. Though given the circumstances, she wasn’t sure how much of a consolation that would be.